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Sick to death of this story, many times over: DiManno

Who was the individual truly out of control, rash and irrational, in that tragic shooting early Saturday morning?

Sammy Yatim's mother Sahar Bahadi leads a rally through the streets of Toronto to the site where he was shot by a Toronto Police officer. (July 29, 2013) (Rene Johnston / Toronto Star) | Order this photo

The obvious inference: A single finger on the trigger behind those nine shots that killed 18-year-old Sammy Yatim.

Twenty-two cops, including some who never even unholstered their weapons, though they were just as close to the suspect and his itty-bitty knife.

One officer — in a rare unilateral exercise of his authority — suspended by Police Chief Bill Blair.

Who was the individual truly out of control, rash and irrational, in that tragic shooting early Saturday morning?

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Neither the police services nor the Special Investigations Unit would release his name. Both cited protocol and the Police Services Act for their mutual zipped lips — as if this were any ordinary, internal human resources matter. Only if the individual is charged will his name be formally disclosed. But CTV reporter Tamara Cherry was the first, on Tuesday, to identify the officer as Const. James Forcillo. It’s unknown whether the six-year service member has ever been investigated or disciplined in the past.

Yet there is nothing typical about the incident, and not only because it resulted in the killing of a teenager on a streetcar. Toronto cops have shot and killed youths before. The outrage has crested before. Vigils and demonstrations have been staged before.

Times have changed. The professional integrity of police took a massive blow as a result of their ham-fisted actions against peaceful protesters during the G20 Summit in 2010, and that rupture has not healed. When more than 90 cops removed their badge numbers before anything untoward had happened on the Legislature grounds, as if anticipating that anonymity would be the wiser course, the public got it. They were hiding.

When cops standing nearby while colleagues assaulted innocent civilians failed to identify the culprits, they were cleaving to the fraternity’s code of silence. The public got that, too.

Had bystanders not documented events on cellphones and video cameras, forcing the SIU to reopen their investigation, no officers would ever have been charged, though it’s still possible not a one will ever be convicted.

Courts and civilians view things differently — even when both are looking at the same recorded evidence.

A criminal charge is rare. A conviction rarer. A cop in the defendant’s dock is always halfway out the door to acquittal before proceedings even begin.

Pardon my cynicism, but I am sick to death of it.

I am sickened by the content of civilian-shot videos which captured that episode in and around the 505 streetcar. Notice that officers on the scene never established a perimeter — cars continuing to drive by, curious pedestrians approaching closely.

I am sickened that a situation so obviously limited in threat, so prime for sensible management and a peaceful outcome, erupted in lethal gunfire by police.

I am sickened that, rather than de-escalate the situation, rather than wait for the SWAT team or a cop expert in negotiating stand-offs, those present — one present — went feverishly ballistic.

I am sickened that a teenager with a small knife, who’d done nothing more hostile than shout profanities, was felled by a hail of bullets.

I am sickened that a suspect already shot and dying was then Tasered.

I am sickened by the sight of the officer who’d fired the volley of bullets being pulled back by other cops, as if he needed to be restrained.

Again I ask: Who was the impetuous and maddened instigator in this cast of characters?

There have been conflicting descriptions of Sammy’s nature, but nothing to explain why the young man would have set this terrible confrontation in motion. If he was in emotional distress, no reasons for it have emerged. The behavior was purportedly out of character. Perhaps he was on drugs, a question which will be answered by toxicology tests from the post-mortem.

But Sammy wasn’t the only person with berserk judgment in that cluster. He’s the one whose body had to be identified by a younger sister, though. He’s the one who will be buried Thursday.

The wrongness of this shooting, the avertable fact of it — so unnecessary, so seemingly unjustifiable — was tacitly acknowledged by Blair publicly expressing his condolences to the family and suspending the officer. He looked grave and grim. He made no comment about the “trauma’’ suffered by his officer, a well-worn counter-narrative left, on this occasion, to police union boss Mike McCormack.

Amidst their grief, Sammy’s family has been exceptionally gracious.

“We want to thank Chief Bill Blair for reaching out to our family and appreciate all (he) is doing to ensure that the matter is being investigated thoroughly and judiciously,’’ they said in a statement released Tuesday. “We trust in the Canadian justice system and will seek justice for Sammy, as he, and all those concerned, are entitled to that at the very least.

“We expect that this matter will be investigated with the fullest measure of the law, so that incidents like this can be better managed and de-escalated before such extreme use of force is ever exercised again. We want to be clear that we do not hold any ill will against the thousands of police officers who work to protect us each day. This is a tragedy for us all.’’

It isn’t though, really, a tragedy for us all, unless that over-used word has now lost all its intense meaning. There is anger in the city, sadness for the lost boy, pity for his family and, yes, relief that we are merely spectators to pain. The news cycle turns and this story will recede.

Only those who knew Sammy best, loved him, will be condemned to grieve forever.

Rosie DiManno usually appears Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday.

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